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House Exploded Just Before a Check, Con Ed Says

Inspectors for Consolidated Edison called to investigate a gas leak in Floral Park, Queens, were minutes away — or less — from knocking on the door of a home on 260th Street on Friday to check for gas levels before the home exploded, killing its sole occupant, a vice president at the utility said on Sunday.

Facing criticism from neighbors and a city councilman, representatives of Con Edison described the response to the gas leak in detail on Sunday. David Davidowitz, the vice president of gas engineering, said in an interview that backup inspectors arrived on the block five minutes before the explosion. They were about to begin door-to-door inspections, standard procedure when high gas readings are discovered outside, as was the case on Friday.

The explosion remains under investigation, but the workers appear to have followed proper procedure for a reported gas leak, Mr. Davidowitz said. “They did what they were supposed to do.”

After another fatal explosion, in Sunnyside, Queens, in 2007, Con Edison made changes in its responses to gas leaks, but those changes were not called into play on Friday because the house that exploded was not the source of the complaint of an odor of gas and was not inspected, he said.

The explosion on Friday, at 80-50 260th Street, leveled the home and killed Ghanwatti Boodram, 40, a nurse and the mother of three. Had Ms. Boodram called to report the leak, her home would have been inspected sooner and she would have been evacuated, Mr. Davidowitz said. But the complaint came from a home next door, where the gas readings were zero.

That call came in at 3:34 p.m., and the first available Con Ed inspector was called at 3:56 p.m. and arrived at 4:05, said Michael S. Clendenin, a Con Ed spokesman. The inspector smelled gas outside the house, and immediately called for backup, Mr. Davidowitz said. The inspector then entered the house and found no indication of a gas leak.

“At that point, he didn’t have any reason to evacuate anything,” Mr. Davidowitz said, adding that the next task was to determine the size of the leak by inspecting manholes.

Outside, the inspector found gas levels of about 20 percent at manholes — clear evidence of a leak. He could not lift two manhole covers. The two backup inspectors, who had been working some seven miles away when they were called at 4:15, arrived approximately 30 minutes later, at 4:45 p.m., Mr. Clendenin said.

According to Mr. Davidowitz, the first inspector told them: “I need help, pull these two covers, then fan out and start knocking on doors and checking buildings.” The workers lifted at least one cover, finding gas levels of 80 percent, Mr. Davidowitz said. The first homes that would have been approached were the ones next to the home where the complaint originated, he said.

The explosion occurred at 4:50 p.m.

“They were about to do that when this building blew up,” Mr. Davidowitz said. “They could have been walking into the building when it happened.”

On Nov. 21, 2007, a similar explosion killed a 69-year-old woman in Sunnyside. Following that blast, both Con Ed and the Fire Department were criticized because firefighters left the scene when utility workers arrived, as was standard procedure at the time. Since then, the procedures have changed, and firefighters stay longer. But no firefighters were called on Friday until the house exploded.

In another change since 2007, inspectors will evacuate a home with a 0.5 percent gas reading inside, compared with a previous threshold of 1 percent, Mr. Davidowitz said. For an explosion to occur, gas levels must be between 5 and 15 percent, he added.

Councilman Eric N. Gioia of Queens, a longtime critic of the utility, called Sunday for the resignation of Con Ed’s chief executive and chairman, Kevin M. Burke. He cited the two explosions and the 2007 steam-pipe rupture in Midtown Manhattan, in which one person died.

“It’s not just that accidents happen,” Mr. Gioia said. “It’s that Con Ed doesn’t seem to learn anything each time.”

In response, Con Ed said only that the utility was working with Ms. Boodram’s family.

Correction: April 30, 2009

An article in some editions on Saturday about a house explosion in Queens that killed a resident misspelled the name of the victim’s husband. He is Dindial Boodram, not Dindail Boobram. The errors were repeated in an article in some editions on Sunday about the return of neighbors who had been evacuated after the blast, which may have been caused by a gas leak. The article on Sunday also misspelled the surname of the victim. She was Ghanwatti Boodram, not Boobram. And an article and a picture caption in some editions on Monday about Con Edison’s account of its response to the gas leak repeated the misspelling of the victim’s surname.

A version of this article appears in print on , on page A20 of the New York edition with the headline: House Exploded Just Before a Check, Con Ed Says. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe